French debate on national identity was a “fiasco”

Libération’s editorial this morning is entitled “rabbit fart” – not exactly a flattering summing up of Immigration Minister Eric Besson’s three-month debate on French national identity. Le Figaro is also critical saying that the Government’s proposals at the conclusion of the national identity debate “fall far short of expectations”.

Libérationcalls the national identity debate “a fiasco” and Eric Besson is the man responsible for it. Yesterday, French Prime Minister François Fillon tried to “bury” the initiative at a government conference marking the end of a three-month public debate on what it means to be French.

The paper’s editorial likens the debate to a “rabbit fart”! It was meant to ask some profound questions but the debate on French national identity has ended with “tails between legs and the sound of a broken trumpet,” the paper says.

When the debate began last November, a large conference was promised at its end with varied proposals and a Presidential speech. “Instead there was a low-key and flat inter-ministerial council with three dull proposals.”

And the sentence of the day is: “A display of grandiose national pomp has been transformed into a Bessonian rabbit fart.”

The paper goes on to say that the Immigration Minister “was betrayed by right-wing elements in the UMP who revealed the real intention of this debate through a series of gaffes…This debate was unfairly putting Islam in the dock and it was disastrous.”

However, the paper notes, the debate’s spectacular failure is paradoxically “a source of comfort” because “its latent xenophobia was rejected by the good sense of the public”

“For once,” Libération concludes, “those who had been designated as ‘foreigners’ won’t be seen as the scapegoats for current difficulties.”

As a bilingual Franco-American, she enjoys explaining everything French to an Anglophone audience…as well as scanning papers from around the world for quirky articles and unique analysis pieces.

DHEEPTHIKA LAURENTJournalist, Press Reviewer

An Australian at heart with Indian origins, Dheepthika has been at FRANCE 24 since 2012. She loves browsing through the papers with a special soft spot for anything Aussie and anything that takes us out of the mundane.

HAXIE MEYERS-BELKIN Presenter

A Londoner born and bred, Haxie joined FRANCE 24 in 2013 and hasn't looked back. She's covered everything from international affairs to culture, but enjoys nothing more than sifting through the papers to find the most insightful articles and scathing cartoons of the day.